Informal Communication

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

JW Marriott Hotel

QUESTION:  Secretary Blinken, thank you so much for the interview.

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  It’s great to be with you.  Thank you.

QUESTION:  Why don’t I start asking about a very important topic for both of our countries?  Democracy was one of the main topics between your meeting with President Lula.  And what do you think that the two countries can learn with each other in t

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Regions: Brazil , Russia , United Kingdom , United States

Topics: Climate and Environment, Energy, Global Health, Human Rights and Democracy

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Munich, Germany

Bayerischer Hof

MODERATOR:  (In progress) for Germany.  Welcome.  (Applause.)

Antony Blinken, Secretary of State of the U.S.  (Applause.)  Nice to have you.

And Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, Minister of External Affairs, Republic of India.  Minister.  (Applause.)

I hope that based on the topic of the session that you will not all agree with each other and we can have some sparks.  We have about 43

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Luanda, Angola

Luanda Science Center

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  It’s a particular pleasure to be here in Angola’s brand-new science museum, to get a chance to see the museum.  I can just see the generations of young Angolans who will come here to be inspired, to have their eyes opened, maybe choose careers in science, and to add to the incredible storehouse of human knowledge.  It’s a wonderful facility, but it’s also, I think, symbolic

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Topics: Climate and Environment, Coronavirus (COVID-19), Energy, Global Health, Science, Technology, and Innovation

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Abidjan, Côte D’Ivoire

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Thank you very much.  Well, good afternoon, everyone.   And for me, it was both a pleasure and fascinating to be here, both with my colleague from the African Development Bank and also from AfricaRice, just to see the extraordinary work that’s being done to get to a place where, as President Biden has said, Africa feeds itself – and actually, more than itself, a place where Africa feeds the wor

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire

PRESIDENT OUATTARA:  (Via interpreter) Ladies and gentlemen, this is an honor for me to welcome Mr. Blinken, Secretary of State – that is the minister of state, minister of foreign affairs from U.S.A. side – in this occasion of his visit.

So we had a pleasant meeting.  We have been good and happy to confirm exceptional partnership between U.S.A. and Côte d’Ivoire.  And I mentioned the fact that we do apprec

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Topics: Countering Terrorism, Global Health

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire

Africa Cup of Nations at Stade Olympique Alassane Ouattara

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Praia, Cabo Verde

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Cabo Verdean Prime Minister Ulisses Correia e Silva

Praia, Cabo Verde

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Davos, Switzerland

World Economic Forum

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  John, thank you very much.

(Applause.)

Thank you.  Thank you.  Good afternoon.  John, my old friend, thank you very, very much.  And as always, here, it’s particularly good to be with leaders from across government, business, civil society.  So when you think about soil, the U.S. Secretary of State is probably not the first person who comes to mind.  (Laugh

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Tel Aviv, Israel

David Kempinski Hotel

PRESIDENT HERZOG:  Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.  Good morning, Secretary Blinken.  As always, it’s such a pleasure to have you in Israel.  This is your fourth trip already in this Gaza war, and we are very grateful to you for your support and for your steadfast commitment to Israel’s safety and to making sure that Israel wins this war, because it’s a war that affects international values and th

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Washington, D.C.

Ritz-Carlton Hotel

MODERATOR:  So on behalf of the broad, diverse USGLC Coalition, business and NGO leaders, military, faith leaders, mayors and farmers from all 50 states, we are honored to pay tribute to Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken with the USGLC’s Global Leadership Award for truly making our world a better, safer place.  Please welcome Secretary Blinken to the stage.  (Applause.)

MS SCHRAYER:  Ple

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Johannesburg, South Africa

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Hello, everyone.  I want to start by thanking President Ramaphosa for bringing together so many government, private sector, and civil society leaders at this important forum.  Last year, I traveled to South Africa to lay out the United States strategy for Sub-Saharan Africa.  At its core, it’s about partnership – what the United States can do with African nations, not for African nations.

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Washington, D.C.

Treaty Room

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Good morning.  It’s a great pleasure to welcome Chairperson Faki here to the State Department, to Washington, for what is now our ninth High-Level Dialogue between the African Union and the United States.  I think this reflects the vital and increasingly close partnership between the United States and the AU, and it also reflects the critical role that the AU plays not only reg

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Jose W. Fernandez, Under Secretary for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment

Ramin Toloui, Assistant SecretaryBureau of Economic and Business Affairs

Washington, D.C.

Benjamin Franklin Room

MODERATOR:  Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the Secretary of State Antony Blinken; Under Secretary for Economic Growth, Energy, and the Environment Jose Fernandez; Special Representative for Commercial and Business Af

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Washington, D.C.

Treaty Room

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Well, good morning, everyone.  It’s always a great pleasure to be with my colleague and my friend Foreign Minister Pandor.  We’ve had many opportunities over the last couple of years to work closely together, quite literally around the world.  But it’s particularly gratifying to have the foreign minister here at the State Department in Washington.

South Africa is a vital an

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

New York City, New York

Rockefeller Foundation

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Thank you.  Thank you very, very much.  So we’re, what, about halfway through High-Level Week, I think – (laughter) – which is known at the department basically as speed-dating for diplomats.  And we have lots of events, lots of meetings, lots of gatherings.  But I have to tell you I was really looking forward to this particular meeting, this particular gathering,

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

New York City, New York

Ford Foundation

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Administrator Power, Sam, my friend, thank you – thank you very much, but thank you especially for truly remarkable leadership at USAID.  I see that every day, and I see that around the world whenever I go to one of our missions around the world; where the rubber really meets the road is in the work of USAID, and it’s extraordinary, and it’s making a profound difference in lives a

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Regions: Moldova , Tanzania , United Kingdom , United States

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Washington, D.C.

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Thank you.  Good morning, everyone.

AUDIENCE:  Good morning.

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Dean Steinberg, Jim, thank you for the honor of joining the SAIS community to help inaugurate this truly magnificent new home.

Jim has contributed so much over his remarkable career, but his most lasting contribution is the generation of thinkers, the generation of d

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Kyiv, Ukraine

FOREIGN MINISTER KULEBA: (Via interpreter) Tony, welcome to Kyiv.  I think that there is – we don’t need any formal greetings because during this time with joint work – specifically with the beginning of the large-scale invasion – our relationship with the Ukraine and United States, they went to such level that we don’t need a – we need everything – what we need is just open and sincere conversation.  And this is what

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Washington, D.C.

QUESTION:  Well, we’re now joined by the U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken to discuss the Black Sea Grain Initiative and food security.  He’s joining us from Washington, D.C.

Secretary Blinken, thanks so much for making time for Focus on Africa.  And I’ll get straight into it.  Russia says it will only return to the Black Sea grain deal if reconnected to the SWIFT payment system.  And all this is happening w

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Washington, D.C.

QUESTION:   Okay.  So I’m going to start by asking you a little bit about the Brazil role in this global crisis of food insecurity because the Brazilian president has a position of neutrality in the war.  Lula has already spoken to President Zelenskyy, President Vladimir Putin.  And do you believe this puts him in a good place to perhaps mediate a talk with – and try to convince Russia to go back to the grain agreement

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Washington, D.C.

Via Translation

QUESTION: Hello, Mr. Secretary.

SECRETARY BLINKEN: Hello.

QUESTION: Thank you for answering RFI’s questions.  You recently accused Russia of blackmail regarding the Black Sea Grain Initiative.  Indeed, Moscow demanded several conditions for their participation in the agreement.  Is the United States willing to negotiate?

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Every August 7th, the State Department community – in Washington and at missions around the world – comes together to observe the anniversary of the U.S. Embassy bombings in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam.

We remember the 224 colleagues, friends, and loved ones, who were killed – including 12 Americans serving our country overseas, and 34 Kenyans and 10 Tanzanians who were part of our embassy family – and the more th

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Regions: Kenya

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Washington, D.C.

Omni Shoreham Hotel

SECRETARY BLINKEN: Good afternoon, Mandela Fellows.

AUDIENCE: Good afternoon.

SECRETARY BLINKEN: What an incredible pleasure to join you for the first in-person Mandela Washington Fellowship Summit in four years – (applause) – and to see, to feel the incredible energy, the ingenuity, the talent in this room.

Liz, my friend, my colleague, t

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

The United States welcomes and commends the strong leadership of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Heads of State and Government to defend constitutional order in Niger, actions that respect the will of the Nigerien people and align with enshrined ECOWAS and African Union principles of “zero tolerance for unconstitutional change.” We join ECOWAS and regional leaders in calling for the immediate release of President Mohamed Bazoum and his f

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Regions: Niger , United States

Topics: Human Rights and Democracy

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Karuizawa, Japan

The Prince Karuizawa

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Good afternoon, everyone.  Let me – let me start with the situation in Sudan.  For the past 36 hours, we and our partners have been focused on how to stop the widespread fighting in Sudan between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces.  Indiscriminate military operations have resulted in significant civilian deaths and injuries, and are recklessly endangering the Su

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Karuizawa, Japan

The Prince Karuizawa

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Well, good morning or almost good afternoon, everyone.  The foreign secretary and I have just spent the last almost three days with our G7 colleagues covering pretty much the entire planet, and I think we both come away from the G7 – well, I should just speak for myself, but I imagine it’s the same – I think feeling very positively about the very strong convergence among all of the

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Brussels, Belgium

European Council Building

HIGH REPRESENTATIVE BORRELL: Good morning. Good morning. I’m very happy to welcome you, Secretary Blinken, in Brussels. We just had a very good bilateral meeting marking our great transatlantic cooperation. Now we will co-chair the EU-U.S. Energy Council, and later we will see each other also at the NATO Ministerial.

Allow me some words about our bilateral discussion.  Certainly

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Washington, DC

Dean Acheson Auditorium

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Well, good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to the State Department and welcome to the second Summit for Democracy.

Jen, to you for your remarkable leadership at the White House Gender Policy Council; to Kat, for yours here at the State Department on Global Women’s Issues:  We could not have a better team, a more dynamic duo, leading our efforts.  And I’m gra

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Washington, D.C.

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, everyone.  Thank you all so much for joining.  It’s very good to be with friends and partners from around the world as we prepare to open the second Summit for Democracy.

In his first year in office, President Biden launched the summit to look at the future of democracy, which we see is at an inflection point.  Worldwide, we see autocrats violating human right

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Office of the Spokesperson

Washington, D.C.

Thomas Jefferson Room

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Well, good afternoon.  It’s a great pleasure to welcome my friend, Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita, here to the State Department, back to the State Department.  We have a longstanding, historic, and steadfast partnership with Morocco, which has been such an important force for stability, for peace, for progress and moderation – something that we deeply value and appreciate.

W

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Niamey, Niger

Presidential Palace

QUESTION:  Mr. Secretary, thanks very much for taking this opportunity.  We appreciate it.

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Thanks, Shaun.  Good to be with you.

QUESTION:  Thanks.  I wanted to ask you – I understand you’re going to announce some assistance today for the Sahel, but I wanted to ask you more broadly about the Sahel strategy.  This has been a few months since the French ended th

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

U.S. Logistics Center Warehouse

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Well, good afternoon, everyone.  We’ve had an enduring partnership when it comes to humanitarian assistance with Ethiopia, going back decades.  And it’s enduring because we’ve had periods of famine, conflict, displacement, and yet throughout we have found ways, working with extraordinary partners like World Vision, like Catholic Relief Services, to make sure we were

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Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Addis Ababa University

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  Well, good evening, everyone.  It is great to be back in Africa, but also to make my first appearance to Ethiopia as Secretary of State.

I’m here in Ethiopia – and then on to Niger – to reaffirm the pledge that President Biden made at the U.S.-Africa Leaders Summit late last year.  As he put it, the United States is “all in on Africa, and all in with Africa.”  That mea

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Office of the Spokesperson

The following is attributable to Spokesperson Ned Price:

Secretary Blinken met with the signatories of the Pretoria Cessation of Hostilities Agreement (COHA). Government of Ethiopia National Security Advisor Redwan Hussein and TPLF Spokesperson Getachew Reda shared the progress that has been achieved so far: silencing of the guns, delivery of humanitarian assistance, restoration of services as well as the disarmament of Tigrayan heavy weapons and significant withd

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Regions: Ethiopia

Topics: Arms Control and Nonproliferation, Refugee and Humanitarian Assistance

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Today I am announcing more than $331 million in new humanitarian assistance for Ethiopia in FY 2023 through the Department of State and the U.S. Agency for International Development.

This funding will provide life-saving support to those displaced and affected by conflict, drought, and food insecurity in Ethiopia. This assistance includes $12 million through the State Department Bureau of Population, Refugees, a

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Regions: Ethiopia , United States

Topics: Refugee and Humanitarian Assistance

Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State

Affairs Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Ministry of Foreign

FOREIGN MINISTER MEKONNEN:  To start off, Secretary of State, we are happy to receive you here in Addis Ababa today.  It’s our honor and a privilege to have such a meeting with this prestigious delegation.  I hope you have a (inaudible).  Thank you for coming, as it is a historic moment to strengthen and deepen our bilateral relations between our countries.  We have longstanding relations

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